John McGahon (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

Where will I begin? I was a member of Louth County Council for six years and every couple of months there were motions about this subject. Many other Members of this House were in local authorities for longer than me and they would say the same, that this is a very common issue. I commend Senator Malcolm Byrne and the rest of the Fianna Fáil group on bringing this Bill forward. Over the past year Senator Wall has been very forceful about this matter as well and has put forward some very good ideas. I will offer my own 2 cent on it.

To give the context, about a year ago I went picking up litter along the verges. I was amazed at the amount of rubbish that is in our hedgerows and verges. It is really sickening. What is even more amazing is how much of it is buried in the debris of a hedgerow, which means it has been there for 12 to 18 months or even longer. This is the result of two things. One is people wilfully throwing their rubbish out the car window and people taking household rubbish and dumping it in rural, isolated places. The other is that there are people who pay disposal people to takeaway waste, but these disposal people are cowboys of one form or another and they are dumping that household rubbish in those areas and nobody is liable for it. This is an ongoing issue across the country, whether it is in the middle of Dublin city centre or in the middle of rural Ireland. It is a common issue wherever one goes.

Local authorities and people's hands are essentially tied as to what they can and cannot do. This legislation tries to offer some tools and powers to local authorities and others to do something about this. Litter wardens can only do so much. They have to physically search through bags of rubbish to try to find some type of incriminating evidence as to who the individual is. This legislation gives local and enforcement authorities more tools to combat any form of illegal dumping and littering.

One of the issues I have had over the years, and this is a personal view, is that GDPR can be an excuse to hide behind in many instances in respect of things that can be difficult to do. People say "Oh no, we cannot do that due to GDPR" without actually examining the matter. To go off on a slight tangent, I encountered that a year ago when I proposed, with regard to rubbish from takeaways, that a person's licence plate should be printed on the takeaway packaging or bags. People said that could not be done due to GDPR. I then had an online meeting with a GDPR specialist who said there are no GDPR rules here. At times, GDPR can be a red herring and a reason not to do things. I am glad we are taking a legislative approach to try to get around that.

To conclude on that point about takeaway rubbish, while I know that on the larger scale we are talking about van loads of stuff such as household waste, mattresses and the like, on a much smaller scale but equally prominent is the waste from fast food outlets. People eat the food in the car, drive away and throw the packaging out the window. There is no recourse and no way to follow up with those people. I wish to be clear about this. There will not be somebody walking around the countryside trying to pick out rubbish to catch somebody. Let us say a person gets a takeaway from McDonalds. Somebody is not going to go to the bin in which the person put the rubbish, take it out and then throw it in a hedgerow to try to catch the person out. None of that will happen. The only people who have anything to fear from car registrations going on takeaway bags or from legislation such as this are the people who are engaging in that type of illegal dumping. Nobody else has anything to fear.

I listened to Senator Casey talking about this. He comes from one of the most scenic parts of Ireland and it is horrific to hear about the dumping that takes place there by people who are coming to the county from all over the country. I see it in my area too. One of the biggest issues in County Louth, closer to the Border area, is massive dumping of tyres. Huge amounts of tyres are being dumped on Border roads and on Annaverna, one of the mountains beside the Border. It is a common occurrence and a number of councillors in Louth County Council are trying to do things about it. What they are trying to do is physically trying to block the roads off at evening times or at the times that type of dumping will take place. To go on a real tangent, there is a lot of illegal fuel laundering around the Border. Louth County Council spends hundreds of thousands of euro each year cleaning up illegal, toxic sludge and diesel. It is not as prominent now as it was when I was first elected to the council because of different things that were brought in over the last number of years to tackle it.

The point of this debate is that illegal dumping is widespread. It can range from the tyres and fuel laundering I mentioned to somebody throwing crisp bags out the window to the substantial household rubbish mentioned by Senator Malcolm Byrne and others. The important thing about this legislation is that we are trying to do something about it. We are trying to arm the bodies of the State and give them the tools to enable them to tackle it and hold the people who engage in these practices accountable. People have talked about this for many years and I am glad we are trying to do something now. I commend Senators Malcolm Byrne and Wall on their strong advocacy on this issue over the last year and a half in this House. It is great to see that we are finally trying to do something about it.